GeForce 8800 GTX vs Radeon R9 280

If you are going to buy a new graphics card and are choosing between GeForce 8800 GTX and Radeon R9 280, there are a couple of things to consider. Cards with more VRAM in general perform better and allow you to play on higher graphics settings. Size also makes a difference. A model with a large heatsink can occupy up to three expansion slots on a motherboard. Be sure you have enough room in your PC case. When comparing GPUs with different architectures, more processing cores and even higher TFLOPS will not always translate to better performance. To help you decide which GPU you need, we have measured frame rates in a number of popular games. For more on how the GeForce 8800 GTX stacks up against Radeon R9 280, check out specs charts below.

Main Specs

  GeForce 8800 GTX Radeon R9 280
Power consumption (TDP) 155 Watt 200 Watt
Interface PCIe 1.0 x16 PCIe 3.0 x16
Supplementary power connectors 2x 6-pin 1 x 6-pin + 1 x 8-pin
Memory type GDDR3 GDDR5
Maximum RAM amount 768 MB 3 GB
Display Connectors 2x DVI, 1x S-Video 2x DVI, 1x HDMI, 2x mini-DisplayPort
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  • Radeon R9 280 has 29% more power consumption, than GeForce 8800 GTX.
  • GeForce 8800 GTX is connected by PCIe 1.0 x16, and Radeon R9 280 uses PCIe 3.0 x16 interface.
  • GeForce 8800 GTX has 765 GB more memory, than Radeon R9 280.
  • Both cards are used in Desktops.
  • GeForce 8800 GTX is build with Tesla architecture, and Radeon R9 280 - with GCN 1.0.
  • GeForce 8800 GTX is manufactured by 90 nm process technology, and Radeon R9 280 - by 28 nm process technology.
  • Radeon R9 280 is 5 mm longer, than GeForce 8800 GTX.
  • Memory clock speed of Radeon R9 280 is 350 MHz higher, than GeForce 8800 GTX.

Game benchmarks

high / 1080p 0−1 35−40
ultra / 1080p 21−24
QHD / 1440p 0−1 16−18
4K / 2160p 10−11
low / 720p 1−2 60−65
medium / 1080p 0−1 40−45
The average gaming FPS of Radeon R9 280 in Assassin's Creed Odyssey is 6100% more, than GeForce 8800 GTX.

Full Specs

  GeForce 8800 GTX Radeon R9 280
Architecture Tesla GCN 1.0
Code name G80 Tahiti
Type Desktop Desktop
Release date 8 November 2006 4 March 2014
Pipelines 128 1792
Core clock speed 576 MHz
Boost Clock 933 MHz
Transistor count 681 million 4,313 million
Manufacturing process technology 90 nm 28 nm
Texture fill rate 36.8 billion/sec 104.5
Floating-point performance 345.6 gflops 3,344 gflops
Length 270 mm 275 mm
Memory bus width 384 Bit 384 Bit
Memory clock speed 900 MHz 1250 MHz
Memory bandwidth 86.4 GB/s 240 GB/s
DirectX 11.1 (10_0)
Shader Model 4.0 5.1
OpenGL 3.3 4.6
OpenCL 1.1 1.2
Vulkan N/A +
CUDA +
FreeSync +
CUDA cores 575
Bus support PCIe 3.0
SLI options +
HDMI +
Bitcoin / BTC (SHA256) 408 Mh/s
Eyefinity +
HD3D +
TrueAudio +
Design reference
CrossFire +
DDMA audio +
Ethereum / ETH (DaggerHashimoto) 21.5 Mh/s
LiquidVR +
TressFX +
UVD +
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